60 free Treasure Island trivia questions with answers — literature quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Almost everything we think we know about pirates, from X marking the spot to the parrot on the shoulder, comes from one book, and this quiz goes through it chapter by chapter. It starts with how Treasure Island came to be: a map drawn to amuse a stepson on a wet Scottish holiday, a serial in Young Folks under a made-up captain's name, and the three words from a travel book that Stevenson called the seed of the whole thing. Then the story itself: the old seaman at the Admiral Benbow, Blind Pew and the black spot, the apple barrel, the one-legged cook and his parrot, the castaway who dreams of cheese, the fight with Israel Hands and the treasure that was never where the map said. The second half is the afterlife of the book: Wallace Beery as the first talking Silver, Robert Newton inventing the pirate accent for Disney's first live-action film, Orson Welles, Tim Curry and Kermit the Frog, the cyborg Silver of Treasure Planet, the prequel Black Sails, a Poet Laureate's sequel, a Star Wars series and a video-game hermit modelled on Ben Gunn. Easy questions are fair for anyone who read the book at school; the expert tier reaches Tom Redruth, Norman Island and Bobby Driscoll's day in court. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on the novel, its characters and its adaptations, and the supporting sentence is attached to each question.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Although published in the 1880s, Treasure Island is set in which period?
The 1700s
Stevenson summed up its subject as 'buccaneers and buried gold'.
Q 02Under what working title did Stevenson originally write Treasure Island?
The Sea Cook
The subtitle was 'A Story for Boys'.
Q 03Treasure Island was first serialised in 1881–82 in which children's magazine?
Young Folks
It ran in seventeen weekly instalments from October 1881 to January 1882.
Q 04Under what pseudonym was the serialised Treasure Island credited?
Captain George North
Stevenson was still a relatively unknown author when it appeared.
Q 05In what year was Treasure Island first published as a book, by Cassell & Co.?
1883
It came out on 14 November of that year.
Q 06Where was Stevenson holidaying in 1881 when he drew the treasure map that started the story for his stepson?
Braemar, Scotland
His father joined in and suggested details that made it into the book.
Q 07What was the name of Stevenson's stepson, for whom the story was invented?
Lloyd Osbourne
He later co-wrote several books with Stevenson and described the model for Long John Silver.
Q 08Stevenson found the seed phrase 'Dead Man's Chest' in a travel book by which author?
Charles Kingsley
It named Dead Chest Island, a barren rock in the British Virgin Islands.
Q 09What is the name of the inn on the English coast where the story opens?
The Admiral Benbow
Jim's parents run it, and a sunburnt old seaman turns up asking for rum.
Q 10Who narrates most of Treasure Island?
Jim Hawkins
The doctor takes over the narration for a few chapters in the middle of the book.
Q 11The old seaman lodging at the inn as 'The Captain' is really which former first mate of Flint's?
Billy Bones
He warns Jim to keep watch for a one-legged man, then dies of a stroke.
Q 12Which blind beggar delivers the dreaded 'black spot' to the old seaman at the inn?
Pew
Silver later says he ran through his share of Flint's treasure at £1,200 a year before turning to begging and murder.
Q 13The rogue Black Dog, who confronts Bones at the inn, is missing what?
Two fingers of his left hand
The book hints that Bones inflicted the injury in an earlier fight.
Q 21Hiding in what does Jim overhear Silver plotting the mutiny?
An apple barrel
He immediately warns Captain Smollett, the squire and the doctor.
Q 22Who is the captain of the Hispaniola?
Alexander Smollett
He is a stickler for rules who later says he and Jim should never go to sea together again.
Q 23What happens to Mr Arrow, the Hispaniola's alcoholic first mate?
He is lost overboard
In the 1950 Disney film he falls overboard drunk on food that Silver has specially prepared.
Q 14When handed the black spot, Silver points out the paper was torn from what, bringing bad luck?
A Bible
The spot is a circle of paper blackened on one side, with the pirates' verdict written on the other.
Q 15The expedition sails from which English port aboard the Hispaniola?
Bristol
Squire Trelawney charters the schooner and, fatally, cannot keep the purpose of the voyage secret.
Q 16What is Long John Silver's job aboard the Hispaniola?
Ship's cook
He had been quartermaster under Flint, and his crutch and parrot fixed the pirate image for good.
Q 17What is the name of Long John Silver's parrot?
Captain Flint
The bird is named, in honour or mockery, after Silver's dead former captain.
Q 18What phrase is Silver's parrot famous for squawking?
Pieces of eight
A piece of eight was a Spanish silver dollar, worth eight reales.
Q 19Which leg has Long John Silver lost?
Left leg, near the hip
Stevenson describes him hopping about on his crutch 'like a bird'.
Q 20Long John Silver was partly modelled on which one-legged, red-bearded editor friend of Stevenson?
William Ernest Henley
Stevenson wrote him a letter confessing it after the book came out.
Q 24Ben Gunn, the castaway Jim meets on the island, had been marooned there for how long?
Three years
Alone that long, he developed one very specific and famous food craving.
Q 25What food does the marooned Ben Gunn crave above all else?
Cheese
Dr Livesey obliges him with a piece of Parmesan he keeps in his snuffbox.
Q 26Where does the bulk of Flint's treasure turn out to be when the pirates dig?
Already moved to Ben Gunn's cave
Gunn had found and shifted it long before, leaving the pirates a rifled, empty hole.
Q 27Ben Gunn's share of the treasure is £1,000, which he manages to spend or lose in how many days?
20
Squire Trelawney's party divides the rest back in England.
Q 28Which pirate does Jim fight aboard the drifting Hispaniola after cutting her anchor cable?
Israel Hands
The name belonged to a real pirate in Blackbeard's crew, whom Blackbeard shot in the knee to keep his men terrified.
Q 29What was the name of Flint's pirate ship?
The Walrus
Flint is dead before the novel begins; the Pirates' House in Savannah, Georgia, claims he spent his last days there.
Q 30How does Ben Gunn scare the superstitious pirates during the treasure hunt?
Shouting Flint's last words from the trees
The pirates become convinced Flint's ghost is haunting the island.